The way students research and write essays could be transformed with the launch of a new kind of online resource.
Textbook Solutions allows students to download books and annotate them electronically, take notes onscreen and perform complicated text searches.
"We wanted to build software that would combine the different physical tools [students] use in their learning into an easy to use electronic workspace," said Phil Webb, of Textbook Solutions, which developed the technology.
One student described the program as like "having a pile of textbooks, a paper notebook and a stack of sticky tags, all available right there on your laptop".
"I can search across a pile of books and within [my] notes, finding what I need in seconds, and I can associate the notes that I take directly with the relevant topic," he said.
There are currently only 11 British syllabus textbooks available for downloading. All are in the public domain, and most belong to the English literature A-level and GCSE syllabus.
But the company hopes to purchase the digital rights to university textbooks, which students could download for no more than £10 each. Given the high cost of academic texts and rising student debt, Mr Webb believes the service, which he estimates could save students up to £150 a year, will become increasingly popular.
"We are getting very positive results from lecturers who are keen to find new ways for their students to gain access to the best learning materials at a low cost," he said.
New technology is having a mounting impact on pedagogy in both schools and universities.
Last autumn, the schools minister Andrew Adonis pledged £125m for educational software, and an increasing number of schools have interactive whiteboards and internet access. More universities are now subscribing to e-journals to widen academics' access to research.
A recent report, ImpaCT2, which studied the relationship between the use of ICT and student attainment, found that access to new technology could improve pupils' marks. The link was found to be stronger as pupils progressed through school.
The chairman of the ImpaCT2 committee, Colin Harrison, a professor of literacy at Nottingham University, said there was no doubt electronic data sources had revolutionised how students conducted research and, to a lesser extent, how they learned. "The kind of software Textbook Solutions is offering could be quite handy," he said.
However, he added, critical reading of the web was the new skill students most urgently needed to learn. One of the barriers to the proliferation of e-books is that providers, wanting to protect patents, have avoided standardising their technology. Consequently, a student purchasing an e-book from a different distributor would not be able to use it with Textbook Solutions software.
Mr Webb admits this is a concern. "We are trying to get students to send us whole reading lists. It would be ideal to be able to supply students with all the textbooks they needed, so we are trying to recognise which books are most popular all over the world," he said.
While e-books have been around for some time, most publishers are only beginning to explore their potential.
Elsevier, one of the largest academic publishers in the UK, offers more than one hundred e-books, available for purchase online. A spokesman for the company said: "We see this direction as the future of publishing, and we are investing in it. Our website allows students to create a private online library of science and medicine related e-textbooks."
But because buyers receive the printed, as well as electronic, copy they still pay full price, leaving cash-strapped students with wallets as thin as ever.